which accent do you prefer British or American?

<<Even if I did, I'd have to edit my post in order for it to be added. And it does show on these forums when you've editted your post.>>

Are you sure? At least on Langcafe, if you change your signature, it applies retroactively to all your previous posts and it doesn't say that those posts have been edited.

<<Not to be cynical, but maybe you just made that your signature 20 minutes ago.>>

Yes, that proves nothing. Also, even if that had been there before that doesn't really matter as your identity was already clear.

<<Kirk was speaking very specifically about one's *native dialect*. If you are doing an impression of a non-native speaker and making non-native errors, then you are *not* speaking your native dialect.>>

Thanks for trying to clarify, Lazar, but I know he gets it. He's just trying to put words in my mouth and stir up more trouble. *Not working*

Anyway, back to the topic at hand, Lazar, I found a site which has some maps with the distributions of New England speech features thruout the region. Definitely work checking out:

http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~dinkin/TLN/

*worth checking out

<<Are you sure? At least on Langcafe, if you change your signature, it applies retroactively to all your previous posts and it doesn't say that those posts have been edited.>>

It works the same on Zompist for sig changes. SpaceFlight's argument is nonsense.

<<Anyway, back to the topic at hand, Lazar, I found a site which has some maps with the distributions of New England speech features thruout the region. Definitely work checking out:>>

Thanks! Those maps are interesting. Unfortunately, though, if you check the bibliography they are from 1941. ;-) So (judging by the dialect survey) I think a lot of the non-rhotacism and pre-R tense-lax distinctions have receded since then. Nonetheless, it is a fascinating snapshot of what the region was like back then. Back in 1941, my (late) maternal grandfather, who had a great non-rhotic Worcester accent, would have been a teenager, just a year or two away from joining the Army Air Corps. It'd be cool to go back in time to see (and hear) Worcester from back then. ;-)

Oh but do you really think all that information is from 1941? Because those maps in that style are from the Telsur project, which is much more recent than that. Check out the main Telsur/Phonological Atlas of North America site:

http://www.ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/home.html

<<Thanks for trying to clarify, Lazar, but I know he gets it. He's just trying to put words in my mouth and stir up more trouble. *Not working*>>

Kirk,

I will stop trying to put words in your mouth if you will quit insulting me. That's all you have to do. You haven't stopped yet. Is it too difficult or something?

And please answer this question, Kirk:

<<(and, I'll note, the only reason he ever did on Unilang was because he was caught--not out of some heartfelt change in ways)??! I don't think so.>>

How do you know why? Can you read minds or something? I don't think so. And that's not the reason. That would be like me saying why you did something, when I clearly can't read your mind and so would never know exactly why you did it unless you told me.

<<Yes, that proves nothing. Also, even if that had been there before that doesn't really matter as your identity was already clear.>>

It was only clear to you, because a lot of the other people in that forum don't post in this forum, so wouldn't know who that was.

<<Oh but do you really think all that information is from 1941? Because those maps in that style are from the Telsur project, which is much more recent than that. Check out the main Telsur/Phonological Atlas of North America site:>>

The text is written from a modern standpoint (and the maps have been adapted to resemble Telsur maps), but if you look on the page for Map 1 and Map 2, it says that they're adapted from the LANE (Linguistic Atlas of New England) which the bibliography says is from 1941. On the Map 2 page, for instance, it notes that the tense-lax neutralization has since spread out over much more of New Hampshire. And non-rhotacism is definitely less widespread nowadays than it is on the map. The Telsur map of rhotacism (found here http://www.ling.upenn.edu/phono_atlas/Atlas_chapters/Ch07_2nd.rev.pdf ) does give a better view of the modern situation.

<<He's just trying to put words in my mouth and stir up more trouble. *Not working*>>

You're trying to stir up trouble. If you weren't, you'd quit insulting me. When will you quit insulting me?

<<The Telsur map of rhotacism>>

It's rhoticism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhoticism, not rhotacism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhotacism

Rhotacism is something totally different.

<<I will stop trying to put words in your mouth if you will quit insulting me.>

No, no. You're confusing "pointing out clear cases of trollery" with "insulting." Like anyone could trust your word, anyway.

<<It was only clear to you, because a lot of the other people in that forum don't post in this forum, so wouldn't know who that was.>>

So, clearly, if not that many are aware of it, tricking people and putting on different personas is ok (I'm talking specifically about antimoon here). Unacceptable.

<<How do you know why?>>

You never changed your ways.

*Anyway, back to legit posters*.... Lazar, speaking of that Telsur site, I don't know if you'd seen it before but here's a pretty comprehensive listing of some of the different NAE dialects (with pretty graphs and isoglosses!). Of course, I wish they had more on the West (and wonder why they split so-cal and nor-cal into different dialect regions, but it's still interesting overall:

http://www.ling.upenn.edu/phonoatlas/Atlas_chapters/Ch11/Ch11.html

<<No, no. You're confusing "pointing out clear cases of trollery" with "insulting." Like anyone could trust your word, anyway.>>

What cases of trollery am I making presently? Can you show them to me? I'd really like to see them.

<<The text is written from a modern standpoint (and the maps have been adapted to resemble Telsur maps)>>

Oh, yeah, that's tricky! I guess I just assumed that any map that ever looked like that was a Telsur map. But I guess they're entitled to use that program for other applications, as well :)

Yeah, in the methodology PDF file it mentions that the maps are from the 1941 LANE.

Just an unrelated note, recently I've picked up the term "Tory-torrent merger" from Wikipedia, to describe what I could previously only call the "Florida oranges phenomenon thingy", in which historical /Qr\/ sequences have become /Or\/. ;-) You can't really call it the "sorry-story" or "sorry-gory" merger, because in most NAE dialects the word "sorry" is, of course, excepted from the merger.